Different
by GoddessOfSuffering
Summary: ("Darkness" is the unofficial sequel of this.) Loki always knew he was different. He accepted it. But that doesn't mean it didn't hurt him when he found out just how different he actually was.


Loki knew that he wasn't like the other Asgardians. He knew that from the moment he first stepped into the training room as a child. He knew that from when he uttered his first spell. What he didn't know was _why_.

Loki had always prided himself on being observant. He could always read a person's expression, detect a lie, and always was aware of his surroundings. But he, for all his talents, was blind to the truth.

He'd always assumed that he was claimed different because of the way he preferred magic and long distance weapons to sword fighting. He was a sorcerer in a realm of warriors. He was called coward and weakling just because he didn't engage in hand to hand combat. "Seidr is a woman's art." They said.

He was disgraced by his brother's friends. He was disgraced by Asgard in itself. He was "A disgrace to his father and the royal family, and to the realm as a whole for having an ergi as a prince." And yet Loki accepted this. He continued practising his magic, and pretended that the hurtful words didn't faze him.

But they did. Oh, how they hurt him. He wouldn't show it though.

Trickster. Coward. Sly One. Ergi. Wench. Weakling. Liesmith. Worthless.

And when he returned from battles with his brother and his friends, battles where they all would have ended up dead without his magic getting them out of there. Battles where Loki saved them all. But of course, Thor got all the credit for everything that went right, and Loki got the blame for everything that went wrong. He was used to it by now, used to forever being part of his brother's shadow. Used to being different.

But he always thought that this was the only difference.

Until That Day.

That day, the day of his brother's coronation. The day that it was confirmed for all of Asgard to see that Thor was officially better than Loki. The day he let the Jotuns into Asgard.

The day his whole world fell apart.

He remembered it all so clearly, going down into the vault and picking up the Casket, watching on with dread to see if his skin would change. And there had been this irritating semblance of hope. Hope that he was wrong. That it was all a mistake. After that day he learned never to hope again.

And as his pale Aesir flesh slowly ebbed away into Jotun blue, with the darker ridges that defined him as who he was, Loki was blind no longer.

The subtle differences between him and those of Asgard, all coming together like some sickening sort of puzzle that displayed the truth.

The way his hair was black like the darkest corners of the ether while his family's was golden like the palaces of Asgard. The way his eyes were so vivid a green that those who dared to lock on them would wilt, while his family's were blue and welcoming like the summer skies. The way he was always smaller, always physically lacking compared to his brother. The way he excelled in ice magic, and that first spell, the one he used to freeze the floors under his brother's feet so he fell, the one that marked him as a sorcerer and therefore painstakingly different. The way he never felt the cold like the others did, the way he could see in the dark like the others couldn't. The way he used his mind as a weapon rather than his fists. The way he was sly and manipulative where his brother was bold and reckless.

Really, the differences were endless.

Loki really didn't understand how he hadn't seen them till now.

The sudden realisation of just how different he was knocked into Loki like a raging bilgsnipe, making him stumble under the weight of it and dropping the casket back onto its stand. But not before he had fully transformed into his true form. His jotun form.

Left as a baby, discarded, left to die. His birth parents hadn't wanted him - why would they? He was small and weak. - and Odin had only taken him for the sole purpose of uniting their realms. Ironically, that by the time Loki had found this out this purpose no longer mattered. He was supposed to be dead. His life had no purpose, he had nobody who truly cared for him, only those who seek to use his power for their own selfish goals. And all because he was different.

Everything that happened after that passed by in a confusing blur. His subconscious driving his body to do what he needed to do, while his thoughts remained in the darkest corners of self loathing.

Funny, how when he had finally realised that the names given to him by the Aesir (Ergi, Weakling, Trickster) didn't matter to him, that he wasn't one of them so why would he be like them? It was replaced by his faults at being as he was supposed to be.

Runt. Small. Weak. Left to die. Jotun. Laufeyson.

Couldn't he get anything right?

But no. Everything he did was wrong, while everything everyone else did was always right. Even when Loki was following in his not-brother's footsteps Loki did nothing right. Thor tries to obliterate the Jotuns, it's fine. Loki tries to obliterate the Jotuns, almost succeeds, kills their King, and it's a bad thing. He would never get anything right.

That's what ran through his tortured mind as he hung from the bridge that night. Hanging onto his not-father's spear, with his not-brother holding onto the other end, held up by his not-father. Held up by the lies he had been fed his whole life. By the people who used him for their own purposes, only for them to not matter in the end. The people he had fought so long to be like, to make proud. But he was too different.

His whole life was a lie.

Ironic, as he was the god of lies.

And as his not-father uttered those final words "no, Loki." even he could not mask the crushing realisation that spread across his face like the jotun blue had just hours before.

His whole life was one massive lie, full of huge mistakes and one aching truth that he could never get anything right. Never live up to his brother. His life was meaningless, because he was different. He was different, because he was a monster.

And monsters always had to be put down.

So even as his not-brother yelled after him, he let go and fell into the void, thinking that finally he had done something right by ending his own painful existence. The universe would be better off without him. Thor would only come to hate him when Odin told him The Truth.

And as he fell through the void, weightless and alone, Loki faintly smiled.

He always had been good at lying.

_Even to himself_.

* * *

**The unofficial sequel to this is "Darkness", so if you want you can check that out too :P**

**Please R&R, let me know what you think.**


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